Almost Doesn't Cut It
by NinjaSquirls
Summary: The life of Remus J Lupin in almost notquite kisses, many of them almost with Sirius Black. Slash. Angst and fluff. RLSB and others.
1. Chapter 1

**A/N:** Another one of those "I saw a challenge comm on lj and decided to do it without actually, you know, doing it" fics...First of 5 posts of two anecdotes each, covering Remus' life from being bitten to his death. So, obviously, spoilers for Deathly Hallows if you, like my dormmates, have not yet read it or heard about it or listened to those of us who did read it bitch about it. There will be slash, and eventually possibly vaguely mentioned sex. Enjoy!

**Disclaimer**: I asked God to give me Harry Potter...and God smacked on the head and reminded me I was a pagan and didn't believe in him, so he wouldn't do jack for me.

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1. 

Six-year-old Remus is dwarfed by the hospital bed where he huddles, pale and miserable. With his eyes closed he is washed out, colorless; faded honey-blond hair, sickly-white skin, bloodless lips, white sheets white pillows white blankets. It seems deliberately staged to create as great a contrast as possible to the only bit of color about him – the swollen, reddened scars that stand out starkly on his flesh.

It has been three days since Remus wandered away from his parents into the woods at the edge of their house. Three days since they found him unconscious under the trees, robes drenched in blood, face the color of death. Three days since the mediwizards at St Mungo's shook their heads and said "No hope, we're sorry, there's nothing we can do." Three days since Fenrir.

Three days since Remus J Lupin, at six years old, became a werewolf.

And now, for the first time in three days, he is starting to wake up, eyelids fluttering, face tensing in pain, body shifting restlessly.

Remus wakes up feeling weak and wrong and ill, even worse than two months ago when he had the flu. There is a bone-deep ache in his side, sharper, stinging lines of pain across his shoulder and face, and he can't stop the tears that form in his eyes.

"Mother," he whimpers, sick and terrified and wanting nothing more than to be held and comforted and reassured.

Then he feels a soft, cool hand on his forehead, smoothing his hair, and when he turns his head, he sees his mother, sitting in the chair beside his bed.

"It's alright, Remus," she says gently. "I'm right here. You've been ill, but now you're getting better, and soon you'll be fine, I promise."

Remus is too young to hear the waver of exhaustion and fear in her voice. But she leans close, to kiss his forehead like she always does when he gets sick, and he sees when her eyes go wide and her face turns pale. She pulls away suddenly, and tries to pretend she just slipped, smoothing her robes and laughing nervously, but Remus saw it, and he knows something must be really wrong with him for his mother to be scared like that.

Remus is six years old, and he can't understand that he has a monster inside him.

_2._

Remus has been at Hogwarts almost a month, and he still doesn't entirely know how he feels about it. The first week was like walking through a dream; still in shock that he'd been allowed to attend at all, half-expecting to come down to breakfast one morning and find the headmaster waiting for him to tell him it had all been a mistake, he was too dangerous, he was being sent home.

He still has a little space at the back of head reserved for fretting about that, but mostly he is too busy, too tired, too lost, too panicked, or too hungry to waste time actively worrying about it, not when they are so many other immediately urgent things to worry about.

He'd been scared he would be completely hopeless, that everyone in his classes would be better than him at every subject, but so far that isn't the case – except in potions, where he's already melted his cauldron twice and several times turned his eyebrows green, but that doesn't count. For the most part, classes are wonderful; the teachers love him, the subjects are fascinating, and Remus has never felt as good about himself as he did the first time he sent a feather floating effortlessly into the air. When he found the library, he was struck speechless by the sheer volume of books laid out in front of him; he missed dinner and very nearly curfew curled in a corner with a towering stack of new reading material the first time, and has gone back every day since. If school were nothing but classes and chances to go to the library, Remus would be in heaven.

Unfortunately, Remus has learned, school also contains other students, and that is a problem. The Ravenclaws and Hufflepuffs are fine; he doesn't know any of them, and they rarely have classes together, but when they do, they are polite at least.

The Slytherins are no better and worse than Remus expected from his parents' stories; one look at his shabby robes, scarred face, and shy manner and they knew him for a target. They tease him mercilessly when they catch him alone in the hallways, push him around in the Great Hall, and do as much as they can get away with in their shared classes. Remus ignores them when he can, and fights back when he has to, and he can see it being a workable arrangement for the next seven years.

A loud burst of laughter a few feet down the table reminds Remus of the real problem: his housemates, or rather his year-mates. If he were to have friends, it would be the three of them, but in a month of living together they have barely spoken to him, and though he came to Hogwarts expecting to be alone, he hadn't realized how much it would hurt to be surrounded by friends with none of his own.

It is mostly his own fault, he knows. There are many reasons to avoid approaching them. First and foremost, of course, is the fear, the all-consuming fear that if he befriends them they will find out about the wolf, and then they won't be friends anymore. But there is also his simple shyness, and a self-effacing nature that makes him wonder what he could possibly offer to this group.

There is the fact that James is already immensely popular and there is talk of him trying out for the Quidditch team, and that Sirius is aristocratically handsome and brimming with arrogance and confidence and anger, and all of that is quite intimidating. There is the fact that the two of them seem well on their way to being the perfect team, inspiring each other to fantastic new heights of trouble-making and rule-breaking, and Remus doesn't want to intrude. He'd befriend Peter, the last Gryffindor in their year, but he follows James around like a puppy, and Remus doubts he would notice anyone else.

And so Remus keeps to himself, doesn't say a word to any of them, and tries not to feel lonely and left out.

Especially times like now, when James and Sirius plot one of the pranks they are already famous for.

"No, no," exclaims a voice that Remus recognizes as Sirius. "You have to do it like this" – Remus can imagine the wild hand gestures – "so that we make sure that Snivellus gets covered without McGonagall being able to see."

"It won't work," Remus says without thinking.

Two black heads turn as one to stare incredulously at the pale blond. "What did you say?" asks James, as if unable to believe that Remus said anything at all.

"I s-said that wouldn't w-work," Remus stammers out under their scrutiny. Feeling the need to explain, he adds, "That charm, it will only last for a few hours, and it will be really obvious that you two were behind it. You'd have to use _Nidorious Improbus _if you want the smell to last a week, and no one will be able to tell you did it."

James and Sirius continue to stare at him, and Remus turns pink and stares blindly down at his plate.

"Did he just –" James asks Sirius questioningly.

"He – he spoke," Sirius answers. The look on his face is inscrutable, and Remus wonders if he is going to hit him.

Remus is so unprepared for Sirius to leap at him, combining a tackle with a rib-crushing hug, that he is knocked out of his seat entirely when Sirius does just that, and they both end up sprawled on the floor of the Great Hall, Sirius laughing hysterically.

"You spoke!" He says again, beaming at Remus beneath him. "James and I were starting to wonder if you were really just shy or actually a hopeless stuck-up prat, but you spoke, and now we can be best friends and it'll be brilliant, you'll see, Hogwarts will never know what hit it, and your advice was brilliant and Snivellus will smell like James' socks for days and I could kiss you!"

For a moment Sirius' face lingers over Remus' in a way that makes him wonder if Sirius actually will kiss him, but Sirius seems to think better of it, and settles for punching his shoulder lightly and hauling them both back into their seats. He spends the rest of the meal in a warm fog of friendship, listening to James and Sirius babble about various schemes to cause havoc, offering the occasional suggestion and once a joke that has both of them howling, trying to keep Sirius from stealing all his bacon, and in general being happier than he could ever remember being before.

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A/N: review please? 


	2. Chapter 2

A/N: found this on my hard drive and realized I never finished posting this story. Oops? I originally intended this to have ten parts, but this seems like a good stopping place. Enjoy!

_3._

Remus acquires his first date in a rather round-about fashion. After admitting under interrogation by Lily during a study session that he harbors a small, unacknowledged, almost inexistent crush on another third-year by the name of Katherine, Lily talked to her friend Mary, who talked to her friend Ursa, who talked to Katherine, and three days later he is informed by Lily that he is to meet Katherine at the entrance to Hogsmeade at 10 on Valentine's Day.

Remus, suspecting that to tell James and Sirius he had a date would be akin to telling Snape to go at the Whomping Willow and have a poke on the full moon in terms of inviting disaster upon himself, attempts to keep the rest of the Marauders from knowing anything about his Valentine's plans. He swears Lily to secrecy, makes no mention of a date, makes up a lie about staying in and reading to keep them from dragging him off, sneaks out under James' cloak after the other three have left.

Sitting in Madame Puddifoot's teashop under a banner that reads "Congratulations on Getting a Bird, Moony!" Remus suspects that James and Sirius found out anyway.

For the first five minutes, Remus thinks, the date showed signs of being something at least close to successful. Katherine was waiting for him by the Hogsmeade sign when he took off James' cloak, looking as nervous as he felt, which was strangely reassuring. She wasn't, perhaps, the kind of stunningly gorgeous girl that Sirius has hanging off him by the dozen (not that he ever seems to care or even notice), but she was pretty, in a thin, bookish way that appealed to Remus, who was also, admittedly, thin and bookish. Remus said hello, she said hello, he said he thought they might go to Madame Puddifoot's, she said yes, and they started walking, a little bubble of uncomfortable small talk, adolescent awkwardness, and the vague, faint murmuring of hormonal desperation. It was far from romantic, but Remus felt he ought to be happy he didn't say something unbelievably offensive, or trip and knock her teeth out, or something equally horrible. All in all, it was going much better than he perhaps expected.

Halfway to the teashop, the cupids appear, and Remus knows that he is doomed.

It is not just that there are cupids; Hogsmeade is a wizarding village, after all, and as such, cupids, that strange and uniquely romantic species of pixie, tend to flock there for Valentine's Day. No – it is that apparently someone (and Remus has a strong hunch that their names rhyme with 'Dames and Mysterious') has bewitched them to follow him and Katherine to the teashop, fluttering around them and sprinkling them with red and white confetti.

Remus attempts a weak, nervous laugh – 'My, isn't this peculiar?' – but Katherine does not look amused. She looks most definitely Not Pleased, in fact.

By the time they get to Madame Puddifoot's, Remus is praying urgently that the cupids are James' and Sirius' only prank, and that he will be left to continue the rest of his date, such as it is, in peace.

The first thing he sees, when he enters the shop, is the banner, huge, gaudy, covered in pink hearts and little birds that are actually, infuriatingly, singing.

The second thing he sees, while trying to look anywhere but at the horrid banner, is the table. Or more specifically, the table in the middle of the shop, in the front, right in front of the huge picture window, where anyone can see the occupants while walking by.

All the tables are decked out for the holiday, but this one puts them all to shame; it can barely be seen under heaps of flowers and lace and other atrocities Remus can hardly describe. And most importantly, this table is roped off by red velvet rope, on which hangs a sign: 'Reserved for Remus Lupin and His Bird.'

Remus turns an unhealthy shade of scarlet and tries to sink into the floor. Katherine looks as though she would very happily kill him and take his ears as a trophy.

"Er," he gasps, eloquently. "I'm sorry, it's my mates, you know, James and Sirius, I'm sure you've noticed by now they have no brains, none at all. Er. I'm sorry."

That mollifies her enough that for them both to sit and make a second attempt at a proper, non-failing date, the kind that could possibly lead to a second date, and maybe even a third.

Remus tries, he really does. He asks her about her classes, and which subjects he likes, and what books she reads, and whether she belongs to any clubs, and what part of England her family is from. He compliments her on her hair, her dress, her eyes, and her choice of reading material. He compares her to a flower.

However, while Remus is frantically making small talk and spouting clichéd metaphors, the teacups start serenading them, loudly. The flowers on the table spell out love notes and bawdy suggestions.

Just when Remus is beginning to wonder if he has died and discovered a hitherto unheard of circle of Hell, the chairs begin to shift, so that instead of safely across the table from each other, he and Katherine are so close he can feel the soft rustle of her breath. From inches away, she gives him a slow, appraising look, and Remus marvels that, after all this, she might still kiss him after all.

Her slap makes his eyes water in pain. He is too stunned to even protest when she shrieks at him that she will not be made a spectacle of, shoves her chair back violently, and storms out of the teashop.

Sitting alone at his table in Madame Puddifoot's, all Remus can think is 'James and Sirius are going to _die_.'

_4._

Remus isn't entirely sure how, in his sixth year, he has obtained a girlfriend. He has resigned himself, had done so years ago in fact, to being the sort of boy who never has a girlfriend – too quiet, too bookish, too well-liked by professors, too many secrets and scars and reservations. He is not James, cheerful and easy-going and a Quidditch hero; he is not Sirius, dark and rebellious and cool. Girls do not follow him around worshipfully the way they do to his friends, girls don't even notice him, and he is not brave enough to talk to them, so the odds of him having a girlfriend just seem pathetically small.

He had been resigned to that, and even happy about it; girls seem like so much work, so much bother, just to make an idiot out of himself like James does every time Lily walks past him.

But now he has a girlfriend, and he doesn't know how, except in the dark, gloomy, cobwebby corners of his mind, where he suspects it has everything to do with Sirius. Sirius, who has at least a dozen girlfriends since the year started, none of whom lasted long enough for Remus to even learn their names. Sirius, whose wildly embellished tales of his romantic exploits leave Remus with a sick, cold, spiteful feeling in the pit of his stomach that he refuses to even begin to contemplate because nothing good can come of it.

Today is the first Hogsmeade weekend of the year, and Remus and Ella planned weeks ago to meet. They aren't doing anything in particular – no repulsive teashops, thankfully, Remus learned his lesson in third year – just wandering about, shopping, maybe getting a drink in the Three Broomsticks. It is a date and not a date, which Remus thinks is about how their relationship on a whole could be described, all ambiguous lines and not-quite declarations and a distinct lack of anything as simple as Sirius and his interchangeable girls necking on the couch in the Common Room.

Drifting aimlessly through Hogsmeade, Remus is rather surprised to find he is enjoying himself. Every other date he can recall going on – a grand total of five – has ended in unmitigated disaster, from the first, terribly pranked Valentine's date in third year to an unfortunately timed date the day after the full moon when he fainted into his lunch.

This date, compared to those, is proceeding marvelously; there is the occasional awkward pause, but Ella has always been easy to talk to, and is one of the few people besides Sirius and perhaps McGonagall who appreciates his dry, literary sense of humor, and her smile when he buys her a chocolate bar from Honeyduke's is, he must admit, quite lovely.

It has been overcast all day, and as they are crossing the village towards The Three Broomsticks there is suddenly a tremendous crash of thunder, and a few gentle drops of rain turn quickly into a torrential downpour. The two of them run for the nearest shelter – the overhanging eave of a closed shop – and it is only after they have been there several moments, huddled together, rain dripping off them onto the mud of the road, that Remus realizes that this is such a perfect romantic set-up as to be lifted directly from the pages of one of those trashy novels he keeps under his bed so no one will know he reads them.

Ella, it seems, has realized it too, because she takes a step closer to him, and takes both of his hands in hers, and then she is closing her eyes and tipping her face up towards his. It occurs to Remus, somewhat dizzily, that she really honestly expects him to kiss her, and that for some reason he is panicking, which is utter nonsense, so he takes a deep breath to steady himself and leans forward to kiss her.

Except that when he closes his eyes, he sees girlishly long black hair and teasing grey eyes, and it is too easy to imagine that the hands holding his are larger and long-fingered and rough, and he shouldn't want the chest pressed against him to be broad and hard and leanly muscled but he does, oh god he does, and with a startled cry he yanks his hands out of hers and runs blindly back out into the rain.

When he reaches the common room, Sirius is standing there, chatting idly with a fifth-year, and Remus, impulsive for once, doesn't hesitate. With one hand on Sirius' shoulder and the other on his chin, he pulls him into a kiss.

_5._

It is the last week of seventh year, and Remus and Sirius are lying in the grass under the trees, in a part of the grounds no one ever seems to go to but them. Sirius has leaves in his hair, and Remus suspects that his clothes are covered with grass stains from their impromptu wrestling match. It started with Sirius calling Remus a wanker, and Remus tackling him into the ground. It ended, as so many things do now, with Sirius pinning him down and kissing him until he gave up. And now they are lying in the grass, both idly watching the clouds overhead, and Sirius' fingers are entwined with Remus', and Remus is once again both bemused and bewildered at how oddly right his life seems to be going.

There are many moments when Remus thinks how really ridiculous it is that when he burst into the common room and kissed Sirius, Sirius didn't shove him away and punch him and refuse ever to speak to him again. There was a brief period of blank staring and shouting and then not-talking that made Remus think he had ruined everything, and then Sirius had cornered him in their room and before Remus had the chance to apologize, again, had kissed him breathless, pressing him hard against the wall, and then everything was back to normal.

Sirius has stopped bringing girls whose names he doesn't remember back to his room, and Remus has stopped pretending to be interested in the girls James tries to set him up with, and when they are alone, there is rather more snogging then there was previously.

But the two of them, they haven't really changed, not as much Remus thought they would. They still talk about the same things and make the same jokes; they still act the same around each other as they always have. James remains perfectly oblivious to the fact that two of his best friends are a couple, simply because they don't act any differently now then when they were just friends.

Remus doesn't know if that means they aren't really in love, or that they've been in love for much longer than either of them have realized, and he doesn't know which is the more frightening prospect.

The whole thing seems rather impossible, and Remus can't manage to resist the temptation to be stupidly, besottedly happy, as much as he tries to tell himself there must be a catch somewhere.

Today, though, lying in the grass, Remus thinks he has found the catch.

"Do you ever wish that we could just be here forever?" Remus asks softly.

"I think I'd probably want some lunch eventually," Sirius says, and Remus can hear the grin in his voice.

"Not right here, specifically," Remus replies patiently. "Just – _here_, I suppose. Bugger, that doesn't make any sense, does it?"

"When have you ever made sense, Moony?"

Remus rolls over onto his stomach and pushes himself up onto his elbows, gazing at Sirius, who is impossibly handsome even with leaves in his hair.

"Everything's so perfect right now," he says. "And in a few days we'll leave, and everything will be different, and it won't be perfect anymore. I wish we could just stay here, and have everything be perfect forever."

Remus slumps forward, burying his face in the grass and his folded arms.

"I don't want to lose you," he says, voice muffled.

Almost immediately, Remus feels hands on his shoulder, dragging him around to face the sky again, and then there is a heavy weight on his legs and the hands are hauling him into a sitting posture.

Sirius, Remus realizes, is sitting on him, gripping his shoulders and glaring at him from barely a few inches away.

"You are never getting rid of me," Sirius growls. "You couldn't if you tried. You'd have to – you'd have to change your name and move to Bulgaria and become a dragon racer and even then, I'd hear about you on the Wireless and track you down somehow. Nothing has to change if you don't want it to, Moony."

"Everything will change, Sirius! It's one thing here, when we live together, and we can go about together all the time. But when we leave, we'll – well, we'll have jobs, and separate flats, and we'll hardly see each other, and even when we do, it won't be the same. Can't you see…" Remus' voice trails off. If he speaks any more it would be obvious he's trying not to cry, and the humiliation of that would be unbearable.

Sirius' burst of laughter is warm, throaty and entirely unexpected.

"Is that all that's bothering you?" he asks cheerfully. Remus almost snarls at him, and settles instead for a glare that would melt steel.

"You could come live with me, you know," Sirius says. "You've seen my flat, and it's a manky little flea trap, but it is mine, and I know you haven't found a place of your own yet – and don't look at me like that, you leave your newspapers with the ads circled all over the common room. But if you came to live with me, it wouldn't matter, and everything would be perfect, eh?"

Remus' natural pessimism has always quailed in the light of Sirius' smile, the broad grin of someone who honestly believes that because he has proclaimed everything right in the world, it really is that way. He wants to tell Sirius not to be ridiculous, the idea of them moving in together is preposterous and can only end in disaster, but Sirius smiles at him, and what actually comes out is "Really? You – you mean it? Really?"

"I always mean it, Moony. Can't you see that I love you?" Sirius whispers, and leans forward to kiss him.

James, of course, chooses that moment to come running around the corner, clutching the Map, and even though they spring apart guiltily, it is still a very long night of awkward, uncomfortable explanations.


End file.
